In the past, when an individual placed an emergency call (e.g., a “911” call), the individual did so via a landline that was associated with a particular physical location. Accordingly, if necessary, emergency service providers could determine the current location of the caller by simply identifying the phone number associated with the incoming call and then accessing the address associated with the phone number via, for example, a suitable database.
With the increase in popularity of alternative voice communications mediums such as cellular phones, voice-over-IP, voice-over-LTE and others, the percentage of emergency calls that are made using these communications mediums has increased dramatically. This has created a very large problem in that when an emergency service receives such a call, they cannot reliably determine the location of the caller based on the caller's phone number alone. Instead, emergency services typically ask the caller for their location before obtaining any additional information from the caller. If the caller is unable to speak or provide directions to their current location, the emergency service may, for example, try to obtain location information for the caller using triangulation techniques or other, often unreliable, location determination techniques. This often results in emergency service providers not being able to locate the caller in time to help them. This same issue applies to Voice-over-IP (VOIP) phones, which are portable and may be used in any location with a suitable Internet connection. There are presently a number of initiatives under way that seek to provide accurate dispatchable locations to Public Safety Answering Point (PSAPs) at the time of emergency calls, but all of the known proposed initiatives require substantial investments in new hardware and/or software on the part of network providers, mobile phone service providers, PSAPs or others.
Similar issues exist in regard to emergency text messages, and other non-voice electronic communications, such as emergency text messages placed from smartphones, tablet computers, laptop computers, and desktop computers.
Accordingly, there is a currently an urgent need for improved systems and methods that make use of existing technological infrastructures to identify the location of individuals making emergency calls, and other calls, or sending emergency text messages via cellular phones, other portable communications devices (e.g., voice communications devices) and computing devices, while still being able to provide the Public Safety Answering Point (PSAP) with an accurate “dispatchable location” (a term well known in the art which may include a civic address, e.g. “1234 Oak Street, Any City, Md., 12345”, a coordinate system location e.g. “WGS84 based latitude and longitude 26.123456,−80.123456”, or any human-understandable location to which a first responder may be sent e.g. “I-95 Northbound at mile marker 131.5” or “Atlantic Ocean, 1.26 nautical miles due east of Boca Inlet, Boca Raton, Fla.”) to send first responder(s) to when such an emergency call or text message is placed.